A/N: Another week, another chapter. Just in case you were wondering, this will not be done by DH's release, not with other things in the stable. Thanks as usual to Lady Starlight for her work on this chapter without which, I am sure that the Astetropes, as Luna or Harriet would say, would have to eat your screen. As requested, at the end of the chapter there is a listing of whose kids are whose, so pay attention, it's only going up here :)
Chapter 25: Release
*************************Hogwarts************************************
December 11, 2015
3:20 pm
"Nathan," Anna gasped, and swatted at the offending hand that was slowly creeping up her thigh, pushing back the hem of her skirt. He just smirked and turned back to his studies, content in bothering her for a while. She sighed and looked across the Library table she was sharing with her niece and a few others.
Her eyes scanned across the table, and settled on a head of red hair, bent forward to minutely examine the small text in an old, leather-bound journal. Anna sighed and looked to Emilia, who was watching Harriet as well. Em just shook her head, and pointedly glanced to an empty seat around the table where her brother had been before leaving as Harriet arrived.
Anna watched as Harriet stood and walked back into the stacks, carrying a large tattered book to reshelve, "Have they even been in the room together in the last week?"
Emilia shrugged as she reached over to shake Xander awake, just as Madame Pince walked past, glaring at them for having the temerity to actually read the precious tomes contained in the vast library. "I don't think so," she replied thoughtfully, "maybe in passing, but that's about it." She shrugged, "Something happened, I don't know what, they won't say."
"Lock them in a room together?"
"Rain already suggested that and anyway...it's rather cliché, isn't it?" Emilia stood and started to stuff her books into her bag. "Let's go flying, Xander," she suggested and he nodded. She flicked her wand at her bag and Xander's, vanishing them to the dorms and took his hand, leading him out of the Library and away from what she had not been able to effect.
Nathan watched them leave and looked over to Anna, "Do you need anything at Hogsmeade this weekend? Do you have your shopping done?"
She shrugged, "I don't think so, why? And yeah, I do." She paused as Harriet carefully placed the notebook she had been perusing into her bag like it was a treasured artifact, and left. "Did you want to do something?"
He turned and looked around the area, finding no one else in this far back corner on a Friday afternoon, before he turned quickly and pulled her over into his lap. Anastasia let out a soft squeak as she landed, then closed her eyes, sighing softly as his hands started to stroke her leg, rather high up under her skirt. His fingers kept slipping upward, until they brushed the edge of her knickers, and she gasped, closing her eyes as a flicker of light filled them. "I thought we might want to stay in tomorrow, then. Maybe, I dunno, you can try on that Christmas present early," he breathed softly in her ear, before nipping at it and she jumped.
"And what incentive do I have for such an event?" she asked, squirming.
"I have a whole box of Honeydukes' best that I'll feed you one at a time..."
"Why not," she replied, smirking as she slid from his lap to stand next to him, "In fact," she reached down and pulled him to his feet, pressing against him, as she took a breath and her eyes sparkled softly, "I don't see why we need to leave our room until Monday." She flicked a wand, packing their books into the one bag they had brought and handing to Nathan. He shouldered it, and took her hand, letting her lead them towards the door. "Come along, Mr. Black, I think you and I have some, close, discussions to undertake."
"If you insist," he sighed theatrically.
***************************A-5, outside of London************************
8:35pm
Tonks yawned and leaned back in the passenger seat of the large, black SUV that she found herself riding in on a Friday night, away from her husband, who if she knew him, was probably settling in with a book in front of the fire. She sighed and looked over at the Auror driving, a rather young man with shaggy blonde hair that could not have been out of the academy for more than a couple of years.
You're getting old, Nymphadora, she thought, and turned back to the front and watched the taillights of the other Ministry Suburban as it pulled over into the passing lane and moved around a slower-moving hydrogen fuel truck. The day had started out nicely, with Remus surprising her with breakfast in bed for no more reason that he 'thought she looked hungry' as she slept next to him.
The teasing for being two hours late, that Harry and Hermione had nagged them with all day, had been well worth it in her opinion.
The day had gone downhill as Remus was called into an all-day session of the Wizengamot to answer, 'Why the government couldn't protect the citizenry against the resurgence in attacks by Dark Wizards?' Politicians, and a certain element of the citizenry, many of whom would be the first to protest any imagined overage by the Auror service, could not understand why they could not just 'magically' stop any actions of the darkness against their tender selves.
With Remus busy, and Harry and Hermione called to Dublin to look into a lead on the source of the werewolves in the attacks in September and October, Tonks had reluctantly decided to ride along with the prisoner transport.
She shrugged, and reached into a cargo pocket on her pants and pulled out her mirror, flipping it open, and touching 1 on the keypad. She waited as the mirror swirled, the colors dancing as the Secrecy Wards on each end aligned with each other, before they solidified into a perfect, tiny image of her husband. "Wotcher, Wolfie," she said brightly, and he rolled his eyes, having long since given up on any public decorum from her.
"How long do you think you'll be?" he asked instead. She watched as the background in the image moved, and settled as he dropped on their couch. It stopped moving as he placed his mirror on the coffee table.
She shrugged, and reached up to brush a lime-green shag out of her eyes, "I'm sorry, Remus, there wasn't anyone else senior available, and I thought you would be stuck there all night too."
"It's alright...I'll be here," he shrugged and took a sip of beer, "Do you want to go get the kids Christmas presents tomorrow?"
"Sure," Tonks replied, looking up, and straining to catch sight of the other SUV, the one with the Vampire prisoner that they had taken on her lawn on Halloween. "We could have gone tonight, but I didn't think a Floo or Portal was secure enough, and I'm not about to make one of these kids have to Side-Along her."
She frowned, and looked over to the driver, "Close on the transport, Greg," she ordered and he nodded, speeding up slightly and pulling into the other lane. Tonks nodded and looked back down at the mirror, "What do you want to get Xander this year?"
Remus shrugged, "I dunno, should we get him and Em something together?"
Tonks looked as if she was considering that, when a streak of blue shot in from the side and impacted the fuel truck just as they started to pass.
The world turned white, and Tonks let out an involuntary scream as the two-ton vehicle was picked up and tossed like a child's toy car, tumbling back through the air. Two Muggle cars passing by exploded, the white flashes of their hydrogen tanks reaching Tonks' eyes just as her vehicle hit the field alongside the highway and started tumbling and bounding, the emergency protective wards flaring.
"REMUS," she screamed, the mirror still open and showing his terrified face, "I..." her world went black as her head hit the windshield.
*************************Room of Requirement****************************
10:20 pm
A circle of alternating red, white, blue and black candles burned softly, casting a pool of yellow light in the center of an otherwise featureless room. In the exact center of the inscribed circle, an athletic girl sat staring at nothing through a fall of unbound, fire-red hair.
She was nude, her clothes folded neatly and sitting just outside the circle with her wand on top. She wrapped her arms around her chest, shivering slightly in the cool castle air, as the words of the woman who, even a week ago, she had thought could have become her grandmother, a woman who had died over thirty years prior, flitted through her head.
Harriet did not need the journal, which was sitting next to her clothes, watched over by Gaheris. He had given her a rather disproving look for a wolf, as she set the candles. She had read them often enough after all, over the last few weeks, to remember the words.
She took a breath as Lily's words filled her head, somehow in the voice of someone she had never met:
The Animagus transformation is at the same time, one of the complex and most dangerous self-induced spellforms to be undertaken by a witch or wizard. The transformation is, in effect a self-transfiguration, a permanent, selectively-triggerable ward that allows a magic-user to transform into an animal.
This series of spells and potions has been severely mischaracterized in the last century. It is said to be extremely complex, and nearly impossible for the average witch or wizard to perform successfully. However, this is only true to a degree. Yes, the spells are complex, but not beyond the means of an average NEWT-Level Transfiguration and Charms student. And while the Potions required are complex, it is the rarity of several ingredients more than the potions' construction that causes difficulties. The potions, after all, do follow the typical laws of such things, and once one realizes that their part in the transformation scheme is to provide the permanent biomodification for the self-Transfiguration to adhere to and act against, their properties can be derived. The discrepancy between the actual difficulty and the perceived difficulty, is, I believe, Ministry propaganda, to keep yet another form of control on the populace. The exact instructions are in this journal, however, so when Harry gets old enough, he won't have to sneak into the Forbidden Section every night for a year, at least for this. If he's like his father, he'll find other reasons.
The main difference, between the Self-Transfiguration into an animal, and the Animagus transformation, in the end, is that the participant does not have the option of choosing their form, moreover it is chosen for them by their deepest subconscious, some hidden layer where a more free self is kept. The animal may be typified by one's Patronus, but not always, as the Animagus does not change, while the Patronus may.
James is still laughing about my doe.
The true danger comes from the first appearance of the animal, when it may appear and refuse to let go, causing a fight between the conscious and unconscious mind that can literally destroy a magic user. The final transformation should never be attempted alone. This is especially true in the case where the animal is a predator, unfortunately...even a small one. Note, bright red Kneazles are remarkably stubborn.
Once the initial transformation is successful, some will start to experience 'bleedover', a merging of the animal and human forms, even as a human, where the senses and instincts of the animal are available and can overwhelm their own. This can be particularly embarrassing, though Padfoot always was a bit of a...dog.
Harriet choked slightly as she remembered one last section:
I did, however, charm this book a touch, where it can only be read by myself, James, or some other Potter down the line or their chosen. It does bring a smile to my face, I admit, the thought that one of my grandchildren would be using this to get back at the Ministry...
Harriet slowly unwrapped her arms and moved to kneel in the circle, looking one last time towards her Familiar, who seemed to not like this idea terribly much. Especially after she told him that he was her back up.
She closed her eyes and reached for her magic, sliding down into herself as images of a thousand places, and a million times hammered at her. She trembled slightly, wavering as the gift she never wanted nearly took her. Gaheris whimpered as she took a breath, Enclosium.
A shimmering ring of blue appeared, stretching from floor to ceiling, before it faded to near transparency. Harriet looked around quickly, her eyes quavering just a touch, as she touched invisible fingers to a lock that hid deep in her soul. She stroked it, feeling something shaking at the bars of the cage.
Gaheris looked through the shimmering field at her as he rose to his feet. He barked, a rather dog-like sound from a wolf, as magic streamed past him, collecting in his mistress.
Harriet touched the cage once more, took a breath, solvo penitus bestia...
She screamed, arching backwards as a sudden, tearing pain ripped from her core. The cage slammed open and a rush of fur and fangs filled her sight as she flopped forward onto her hands and knees. She shook as a thousand animals fought each other for dominance, each one, one that could be her, somewhere.
Sirius...she whimpered and fell over to her side as she felt her body changing...
Gaheris took one last look at her and sprinted from the room, a doggy door appearing just milliseconds before he reached the door.
Harriet felt tears spring to her eyes as her body fought the change, knowing it should not be this hard, and a tiny part of her brain that was still functioning, was already working though the differences in being a seer that was most likely causing it.
A thin trickle of blood slipped from one nostril as she curled into a tight ball, whimpering faintly. She took a shuddering breath, and her eyes snapped open to reveal vertical black pupils in her grey irises. Her hair seemed to move as a pair of rounded, furred ears stuck up through her hair, and a long, furred tail, with jagged black stripes over red fur, grew from her coccyx, to wrap around her body...
****************************Gryffindor Tower*****************************
"Xander, I'll see you tonight," Emilia said pointedly, laughing faintly as he gave her a mock disappointed look and kissed her, before leaving with Nathan and Justin, to Nathan's Common Room, where Nathan's ever-recalcitrant broom was resting on a rack, not working properly as usual.
Four years ago, when Nathan was begging for a broom, Ginny had decided that a bit of fiscal responsibility was in order for her children, and had, despite her husband's bemused comments, made the kids earn enough to purchase their own brooms. It was for this reason, that her oldest had, for the last three and a half years, spent almost as much time working on his broom as riding it.
Anna refused to ride it.
The broom, an actual, nineteen-ninety-eight Firebolt, had been one of several seized in a liquidation sale by Gringotts of a French Quidditch equipment chain that had gone out of business, mostly due to the ever increasing presence of WWE. The price had been a literal steal, less even than a slightly-used Cleansweep 2002, that he thought he was going to be stuck with.
The axiom was, as was with most such things, true.
Emilia smiled absently, and watched as the portrait closed behind Xander, noting in a tiny corner of her mind that she needed to get him new jeans, before she looked back at Rain across the expanse of a chessboard.
Rain sent her knight forward, it took two steps forward, and one to the side, and leapt straight up off the board, coming straight down behind Emilia's bishop.
The knight swung a tiny sword sideways and the bishop fell to its knees, only to have its head fall to the board on the return swing. Rain grinned, before looking back towards the main portrait hole, her smile slipping. "Have you seen Harriet in the last while?"
"No," Em admitted, "she slipped out about two, three hours ago, you don't think that..." She looked down as something tugged on the leg of her jeans, to find Gaheris looking up at her, with...panic in his canine eyes. She watched him pace towards the portrait hole and stopped halfway, looking back at them, coming halfway back again, and pacing back to the door.
"Something's wrong," Rain said, even as she and Emilia were following the wolf out the door, not even conscious of having left their seats. Gaheris took off at a near sprint, and they ran after, barely keeping him in sight as they ran along the length of the seventh floor corridor, until they slid to a halt next to the tapestry of Barnabas.
Emilia yanked open the door to the Room of Requirement, and sprinted in, sliding to a stop just inches from the spell barrier, which had gone nearly opaque. Her eyes lit as she instinctively thrust a hand forward, and she screamed, falling to her knees as the energy of the spell ripped through her like electricity going to ground.
The ward collapsed with a loud, terrible ripping sound, and a bright white light filled the room.
"EM," Rain snapped, as her vision cleared, to reveal the shattered remains of the candle circle, and lying on its side, a small, red and black...tiger.
Emilia dropped to her hands and knees, took a breath and SHIFTED. The black lioness padded forward warily, not glancing over to find the blue-black puma that she knew was to her right. Emilia bent low, and sniffed at the unconscious cat, and looked over to Rain, finding the startling blue eyes in the black fur, as startling as the green ones against her own night black fur. She nodded, and lay down next to the great cat, purring slightly as she rested her head on its neck.
Rain dropped on the other side, and both of them crowded in, paws draped over the red and black newcomer.
Slowly, after a great number of minutes, the tiger opened her eyes, and looked at Em, the grey eyes ones that had never existed in a mundane tiger...of course most tigers were not red and black and most lions, not jet black, either.
Emilia nuzzled her neck and stood, pacing back a step and sitting back on her haunches. She changed in the next instant, her black fur sliding up, and seeming to fade back into her skin as the hair on her head lengthened. Limbs shortened and realigned as her spine shortened, becoming upright. She sat, looking at Harriet for a moment longer, still partially a cat, with a long, black tail sticking out from the top of her loose jeans, pushing them down her bum, and a pair of tufted, cats' ears sticking out from her hair.
Cat-pupiled green eyes slowly blinked and she returned to normal, the tail retreating into her spine, and her ears dropping and changing back to merely human. She reached back and pulled up her jeans, and glanced over to Rain, who was still in her neko form. "I can't do the half thing in jeans," Emilia half complained, and Rain shrugged, and fully transformed back, fixing her own clothes as well.
"I have a slit cut in some of mine," Rain replied, shrugging, "or skirts."
Emilia leaned forward and petted Harriet's side, "Transform back, sis...its all you have to do."
Harriet looked at her, and then Rain, and her feline features scrunched up, and her fur rippled. A long, long, timeless minute passed, and then, all at once, the fur retreated around her body, adsorbed back into her skin, like some film being shown in reverse. Her limbs shortened and changed, as her spine shortened, moving her limbs back upright. Her snort slipped back, retreating into her face, and she paused, panting slightly, almost purely human save for the long red and black striped tail and the rounded ears sticking up through her hair.
Emilia smiled at her, and kissed her cheek, "You are doing great, just finish it now, love, and it'll be cake from now on."
Harriet nodded and closed her eyes, and the tail seemed to race back into her body, the ears took a few seconds longer as if they really wanted to stay before they too retreated beneath her hair.
Emilia stroked her hair behind a purely human ear, as her 'sister' lay panting, and shivering. She sat back as Rain conjured a blanket and draped it over Harriet's body, covering her; before they both dropped back down to hold her between them. "You alright, sis?" Emilia asked after several minutes and Harriet nodded. "You did it...you know...now we just need to get you transforming with your clothes and gear and were all set."
"You aren't...mad at me?" Harriet murmured, her voice wavering slightly.
"No, though I wish you had let Rain and I know. You alright now?"
Harriet nodded and the other two girls sat up, scooting back as Harriet rose to her hands and knees, and SHIFTED, her body flowing effortlessly into the tiger, like water from a pitcher. She paced around Emilia and licked her face, and Em laughed, before Harriet transformed back, to sit between them again, seemingly not caring about, or more likely, not noticing her nudity.
"What happened?"
"I dunno," Harriet replied bringing her knees up in front of her and wrapping her arms around them. She rested her chin on them, and looked over at Em with her eyes, "From what your Grandmum said, the vision of the animal should flow over me...I expected a bit of a tussle at first...but then I saw hundreds of different animals...all wanting to be...me. I guess it's my...curse again," she added, slightly bitterly.
"We'll need to start working in your form in training...probably need Sirius' help with that, he's actually better at fighting in his animal form than me-"
"Can't you help?" Harriet asked, in a voice of almost panic. "Please, Em."
Emilia sighed and stood, pacing quickly over to a wall that changed even as she moved, to a replica of the tower common room. She looked out a window as Harriet noticed she was naked, or got cold, and started to dress. "Harriet...even if you and he don't end up married and with sprogs, you are going to have to work this out. I don't know if you did something or he did, or what," her frustration filled her voice, "but you really need to try to fix it. He l...cares a lot for you, no matter what has happened."
"I know," Harriet replied in a small, small voice. She finished pulling on her jumper and toed into sandals, before vanishing the remains of the candles. She bent from the waist and picked the journal up off the floor, and extended it towards Em. "You might want this back, it is your Grandmum's."
"Give it back to Sirius," Emilia replied, turning back from the window, "he normally keeps it." Harriet frowned, but pulled the book back, cradling it against her chest like it was a child. "Let's go to bed before we have to explain to Smythe what we were up to." She held the door for the other two and a noticeably happier wolf as they trooped out into the corridor, and headed off on the long path to home.
***************************Outside of London*****************************
11:10pm
Spears of blue strobe lights lit the moonless night from at least a dozen Muggle police vehicles, along with the beams of a pair of slowly floating gunships as they minutely examined the ground around the wreckage of the fuel truck. A low fire still burned in the wreckage, the parts of the vehicle finishing consuming themselves after the explosive fuel was long gone.
Near the wreckage of the prisoner transport, Harry rose from a knee, brushed off the legs of his jeans and headed over through the night towards a grouping of people standing around the back of a white ambulance. He looked over to his right, causing the flickering light from the fires to dance off the lenses of his glasses, and back to the others.
He passed through a cordon of armed Muggle patrollers, flashing his black Aurors' badge, it appeared to them as a MI-6 ID. He stopped next to Hermione; she gave him a pained smile, and turned back to the occupant of the back of the ambulance.
"You know that we can't let you go anywhere, Tonks?" Harry asked, shaking his head ruefully as he bent over her, pushing aside her limp, still green hair to examine the bandage over her forehead. Her arm and leg were splinted, and her ribs were wrapped under the blanket she was covered to up to her chin. He touched her forehead again, "Are you trying to be me? It's a touch late for Halloween, you know."
"You are truly a funny wanker, you know," she growled and coughed. She looked up at Remus as he bent down from his seat on the bench next to her, and kissed her forehead, before sitting back up, continuing to hold her good hand. "Oh, don't you get all worried, this is all physical, I'll be fine as soon as we get out of her and I can morph a touch. Now did you get anything, I'm afraid that I was a touch out of it."
Harry shrugged and dropped to the bumper of the ambulance, the medics that would have normally been in the back with them having been sent away for security reasons, by the other Agent Potter of MI-6. He waved over at the wreckage, "Calvin O'Malley is up from Crendenhill, he says hi to your Dad, Mione."
"I think Dad and Mum were going to the Regiment reunion in Herdford next month, I'll let him know...So what did he have to say."
"He's a Squib, so he knows us from both sides, he said to tell Em and Xander congrats by the way, so he's covering....but what we found, it was a set up." Hermione crooked an eyebrow, and Harry shrugged, "Seems that no one was killed," her eyes widened, "Yeah, interesting isn't it, the fuel truck was an automated one, and both of the Muggle vehicles in the blast zone were just outside of the lethal zone with the newest safety gear in them. The truck was hit with a Reductor, though it looks close enough to a Plasma rifle strike that Calvin is going to put it in his report as terrorism."
"It is."
"Yeah, but not like they are used to. Don't know if that explanation will pass muster for long...since the only toys out there are in the hands of the American main-line forces or the Commonwealth's, every one else still doesn't have them."
"That's awfully professional, and courteous for Death Eaters," Remus put in thoughtfully.
"Isn't it?" Harry replied, "The truck was hit to cut you off, and one of our Runaway Grabbers was used to stop the lead car. The Aurors were disoriented by the sudden stop then all three were stunned, before they could act. Pulled the prisoner, and they are gone."
"Why go to all this trouble to get their vamp back and then take even more care to leave our agents alive, not that I'm complaining, mind you," Hermione said, "Honestly, it doesn't make any sense..."
"Unless they are trying to," cough, "tell us something," Tonks replied painfully.
Harry nodded, and stood, taking Hermione's hand as she stepped out of the ambulance. He motioned the medics closer; "They'll take you to the usual cover hospital, you going with her, Remus?"
"Yeah."
Two minutes later, Harry watched as the ambulance pulled out, its lights flashing, before he opened the door of Hermione's BMW, and closed it after she slid behind the wheel. He moved around to the passenger side and slid in, leaning back as she pulled out, flashing his identification to the pair of patrollers standing guard, before she rapidly drove off into the night.
Hermione waited until the reached a stretch of empty road, and touched a pair of unlabeled knobs under the in-dash MP3 player. Out the window, the hood of the car shimmered and vanished, before the car sped up abruptly and leapt into the air. The ride, already smooth, became glass-like as the car literally drove on air. Hermione set the "cruise control" and leaned her seat back slightly before looking over at Harry. "You know that no one outside of the Auror service, and my parents, even knew that we had her, or and an even smaller group knew that we were transferring her to the Non-Human holding facility in Leeds."
"The thought had crossed my mind," Harry replied darkly, "Let's just get home, Hermione, I think that Tonks will have some work to do when she heals herself."
A/N: There you go. Next chapter, Walls Fall...that's all I'm saying, they fall...
Ok for all of those of you who were wanting an outline of whose kid is whose, who they are dating (shagging) and some other stuff here it is. And note, I don't normally do this and these aren't in any particular order, dates are in American standard, cause I'm too lazy to translate:
Name DOB Parents Dating/Spouse/Bonded
Good Guys
Emilia Luna Potter 5/23/1999 Harry and Hermione Xander Lupin
Sirius Ronald Potter 4/8/2000 Harry and Hermione Harriet Weasley
Harriet Molly Weasley 3/15/1999 Ron and Luna Sirius Potter
Anastasia Lillian Granger 5/23/1998 Roger and Jane Granger Nathan Black
Xander James Lupin 3/27/1999 Remus and Tonks Emilia Potter
Abigail Annette Lupin 2/17/2001 Remus and Tonks Elliot Longbottom
Elliot Neville Longbottom 7/25/1999 Neville and Parvati Abigail Lupin
Nathan Augustus Black 12/31/1999 Draco and Ginny Anna Granger
Justin Julius Black 2/1/2000 Draco and Ginny Rain Kincaid
Rain Mai Kincaid 8/2/1999 Malcolm and Dyani Kincaid Justin Black
Shin Anabelle Finnegan 2/28/2001 Seamus and Padma Free agent at this time
Lawrence Weasley 2/15/2000 Fred and Angelina Aiko Inoue
Virginia Anne Weasley 2/15/2000 Fred and Angelina Kristina Spurr
Andrew Weasley 7/1/1998 Bill and Fleur Free agent at this time
Robert Charles Weasley 8/12/1999 George and Alicia Free agent at this time
Michael Kincaid Malcom and Dyani Free agent at this time
Daniel Kirkpatrick Chastity Turner
Kristina Spurr Virginia Weasley
Enemies/Rivals
Naomi Jamillia 2/15/1999 Wants Sirius
Antares Parker 3/1/1999 Antony and Clariese Marisah Hamilton
Maraisah Hamilton 4/27/1999 Xavier and Elizabeth Antares Parker
Banner Bancroft 1/2/1999 Oliver and Pusha Are you kidding?
Lucas Plessy 7/13/1999 Timothy and Maltilda Nope
That's all I'm revealing at the moment, some don't have parents listed or DOB's sorry. There
are additional kids, that will show up eventually, but for now, that's most of the ones with speaking
parts.